


There's a hole in my soul (I can't fill it)

by who_needs_words



Series: short fics for A-spec Archives Week 2021 [4]
Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: A-spec characters written by an a-spec author, Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Aromantic Gerard Keay, Aromantic Jonathan "Jon" Sims | The Archivist, Asexual Gerard Keay, Asexual Jonathan "Jon" Sims | The Archivist, Aspec Archives Week (The Magnus Archives), Canon Asexual Character, Gen, No beta we die like archival assistants, Queerplatonic Relationships, queerplatonic soulmates
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-15
Updated: 2021-01-15
Packaged: 2021-03-12 23:35:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,003
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28768677
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/who_needs_words/pseuds/who_needs_words
Summary: Fate brings Gerard Keay and Jonathan Sims together. Choice gives them a lifelong partnership.(Or: Queerplatonic Jon and Gerry in a world of soulmates)
Relationships: Gerard Keay & Jonathan "Jon" Sims | The Archivist, Queerplatonic Gerard Keay/Jonathan "Jon" Sims | The Archivist
Series: short fics for A-spec Archives Week 2021 [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2106123
Comments: 1
Kudos: 49
Collections: Aspec Archives Week





	There's a hole in my soul (I can't fill it)

**Author's Note:**

> Title from "Flaws" by Bastille 
> 
> This is for the forth day of A-spec Archives Week, the prompts for Thursday were "Choice/Peace/AU"
> 
> Look...look. I know it's not Thursday anymore, but I'm really, really proud of this fic. I was stupidly busy today and didn't think I would even get anything out. So when I sat down at like 8 pm to write this it was meant to be maybe 600 words. A short thing for a fun AU. Then it became the longest fic for I've written for this event yet. Queerplatonic jongerry stole my heart and they don't plan on giving it back.

Fate lead Gerard Keay to The Magnus Institute. This is a fact. A not exactly true fact but a fact none the less. 

His mother wasn’t a fan of soulmates. She sneered at the very thought of them. Love in her mind was a weakness, her own string only a tool to use for greater goals. Her string connecting her to Gerry’s father had always been weak. She’d told him once that Eric’s end had been strong and steady but Mary’s own had always been frayed. 

That was all the confirmation a young Gerry had needed for him to know that when he met his promised other half he would do everything possible to make sure their connection was the opposite of Mary’s. Mutual love and respect with zero murder. 

As the years went on he become less and less convinced of the idea of soulmates. He wouldn’t argue their existence. He had seen enough people pull themselves out for domains simply by following their string to know that. He also wouldn’t argue the existence of his own string. 

As long as he could remember he had seen it. Red like fire and blood as it twisted off along the narrow London streets, always heading south and little west. Leading to Gerry’s promised other half. 

No the problem lay in the fact that Gerry wasn’t interested in romance. 

Despite what media would have you think most people didn’t wait for their soulmate. They dated, had crushes, and sometimes even married non-soulmates. The idea of waiting for your soulmate was an outdated concept. It lead to two people entering into a long term, dedicated relationship and having no prior experience. 

Just because your soulmate was the perfect one didn’t mean they where the only one for you. Love and connection comes in many forms. Those connections- those are what saved people. It was the only reason Mary had ever built a relationship with Gerry's father. 

He had seen it time and time again- anchors aren’t a synonym for soulmate. 

Gerry had watched his peers and would be victims alike develop crushes, go on dates, introduce each other to their families, and so on. They felt romantic love for people other than their soulmate.

The realization that you could feel that kind of emotion for someone other than your soulmate was what solidified it for him. Gerry wasn’t just not interested in sex, he wasn’t just waiting for his promised other half. Gerry didn’t feel romance the way others did.

Love yes, companionship yes, affection yes, loyalty yes. But romance? Gerry wasn’t sure what romantic love even felt like. He had never had it, and he didn’t think he ever would. Ehen he thought of his soulmate he didn’t feel it either. 

He felt many things regarding his promised partner- but not romantic love. He worried for them. To be his soulmate they must be somehow involved in the word of monsters and fears. Moreover he cares for them. If one day they would unreservedly care for him than he would care them in turn. 

He was nervous too. How does one tell their soulmate you don’t love them- but you do love them? Just not in the romance way. 

He was excited as well - this was his soulmate. And soulmates understood and loved you unconditionally. 

Mostly he looked forward to the companionship; in whatever form that would be. 

\---

In 2005, years before he would get his tattoos and link himself to the eye, and three years before his mother would skin herself his string moved. 

For the little more than two decades of life his string had always pointed southwest. It was still pointing west but now it pointed northwest. His soulmate had moved- Oxford perhaps? Or maybe they had gone further- Buckingham maybe. He assumed they were going to uni, but not necessarily. If they were roughly his age it would make sense. 

It was in 2011 that things really changed, at least in regards to his soulmate. He’d been living under his mother’s ghostly thumb for years. As much as he wanted to escape no solution had presented itself. Gerry just had to keep on going.

Harold Silvana, Rachel Turley, Alf Bartlet, Andrea Nunis, the list goes on. He’d helped those people and more every time he burns another damn book. He remembers their faces whenever he feels like drowning in the horror he faces daily. He may be trapped in this powers-cursed shop but he can still help people. 

Then his soulmate moves to London. 

\---

The glittering string connecting them changes direction again. In goes from northwest to almost due north and a little east. There is something different about this move. This time they’re near; he can tell. 

The string pulses and twitches with small changes in direction. Sometimes on the weekends Gerry’s soulmate will go ‘round and ‘round, as if wandering London. On week days they’ll go back and forth from northeast to due south. _Dairy commute._

Even the string itself is more colorful, more bright. His soulmate is in London. Of that he’s sure. 

He follows the string on a Friday morning. As soon as the string moves, signalling his partner’s commute Gerry sets off. He gets on at the tube stop in Morden (he’s lucky the tube runs this far out) and follows the string north. He takes the black route all the way to the Embankment. There the string turns sharply and Gerry exits. From there he follows the string as it twists and turns it’s way through Westminster. 

Finally, at long last, after more than 20 years, he find the end of his string. 

At The Magnus institute. Fuck his life. 

The Magnus Institute. The very living, breathing heart of Beholding. God if his soulmate hasn’t gotten themselves right into the thick of things. The Magnus Institute. He would honestly a little impressed if he wasn’t also scared out of his mind. 

Right in the thick of things; not that Gerry can blame them. They probably can’t leave leave well enough alone either. 

_Honestly._ At the very least he figures they are probably competent. There was also a not small likelihood they had already encountered the powers. 

On one hand he would never wish that on anyone. On the other it meant they would be more likely to believe him when he explained. Because he would. He wanted them to be partners, no matter what form that would take. And partners had to be equal, so Gerry would tell his soulmate all he knew. 

But first he had to meet his soulmate. Which meant going in that front door. 

He wasn't sure he could do that. But he also couldn’t exactly wait around in front of the institute for his soulmate to emerge. It was barley ten in the morning. Maybe he could sit in one of the coffee shops around and hope- for what? That his soulmate noticed him and came to investigate on their luck break? Unlikely. 

Luckily, or perhaps unluckily someone noticed him. 

“Hello?” a voice called, soft and feminine. He looked up. Gerry had been standing on the stairs for a few minutes now debating. Above him a young lady poked her head out the door. A secretary perhaps? “Can I help you?” 

Gerry might as well go for it. This kind of thing couldn’t be too unusual could it? The whole point of the string was for you to follow it to your soulmate. He went up the stairs to meet the women. 

“I uh… maybe?” Gerry said. The women, Rosie according to her name tag, looked him up and down. Not judging him but assessing him for threats. 

“Are you here to make a statement?” she asked. That would be the perfect excuse. Tell his soulmate _‘oh yeah, I came to give a statement and ended up seeing my string lead off into the building, funny coincidence huh?’._ Alas, but no. Lying to his soulmate as soon as he met them was something his mother would do. 

“No- I.” Gery cleared his throat as the women raised an eyebrow. “My-string. It- ” he pointed inside. “It leads inside.” Rosie’s face cleared instantly.

“Oh not to worry dear. Come in, come in. You're not the first in this situation and you wouldn’t be the last.” Rosie ushered him inside and towards the reception desk. He was right about her being a receptionist then. “We have a protocol for this. I just give you this.” She pulled out a lanyard and handed it to Gerry. It was plain red with _’following my soulmate string’_ written on it. Blunt and unsubtle but effective. 

“Now I can’t let you stroll around unsupervised. So you just follow your string and I’ll ] make sure you don’t wander anywhere you aren’t meant to.” Rosie continued. Gerry nodded and gave a tense smiled. 

Together they set off through the halls of the institute. Gerry followed the pulsing light of his string as Rosie chatted his ear off about something. Something about a man named Tim and bowl of pudding.

Together they wound their way up to stair case and up a few flight of stairs. (Why didn’t this place have elevators?) Eventually they found their way to the third floor. His string turned at a closed door labed ‘research’. Gerry stopped in front of it and stared.

His soulmate was only a few feet away. So close he could practically touch them. 

“Here,” Rosie said, jolting Gerry out of his thoughts. “I’ll just knock shall I?” She reached out a closed fist only for the door to be violently slammed open before she could. Gerry had only a moment to process the sight before him. A slight, short man with long dark hair pulled up into a simple bun. He was dressed in the most stereotypical academic outfit possible; a pressed blue button down, sweater vest and khakis. Somehow for all it was not Gerry’s style it suited him.

Then all Gerry could see was the finger pointed in his face.

“You!” The first thing Gerry noted was his voice. It was nice, good for long hours of reading. The second thing was the fact that Gerry’s string ended in his chest. Right above his heart. 

The third thing was a realization. _His Soulmate._ This short man was his soulmate. 

“Me.” he said, because apparently Gerry had no filter. He vaguely noted Rosie backing away, a shit eating grin on her face. 

The man- his soulmate, was staring at Gerry’s own chest. Right where the string connecting them vanished into Gerry’s heart. He waited for his soulmate to say something. When nothing was said Gerry opened his mouth. He had no idea what he was going to say. A greeting, hopefully. 

“I’m not going to marry you.” Fuck. What a way to stick his foot in his mouth. God. 

“I would hope not.” the man replied. He sounded, relived? Was Gerry reading him right? 

“What I mean,” Gerry said “Is that… I don’t like people. Crushes, I mean. Uh. There’s a word. I don’t do romantic love.” 

“Aromantic” the man supplied. He was looking Gerry in the eyes now. Nice eye too, Gerry noted. Sharp and analytical. They made Gerry feel seen, but not in a Beholding way. More like this man would listen and respect Gerry. 

“I...I feel that way too.” Gerry’s soulmate said. “I Don’t know what romantic love feels like. I still love and care about people- just not the way everyone thinks I should. It’s always platonic.”

Gerry found himself smiling. A soulmate was a life partner, someone who understood you. He felt honored his blunt, clever eyed man would be his partner. 

“I’m glad”. Gerry said. “I- I would like to talk more.” He extend a hand and gave the man a smile. “Gerard Keay- but please call he Gerry.”

“Sims, Jonathan Sims” the man- Jonathan said. “Most people just call me Jon.” Jon’s hand was warm as it fit into Gerry’s.

**Author's Note:**

> And then they lived happily ever after. And hunted leitners, and Jon didn't become the Archivist because Jonah couldn't risk the combined might of Jon and Gerry. And jon forced gerry to go to the doctors so our dear goth doesn't die of brain cancer. And honestly this AU could keep going. Maybe someday I'll explore it more.
> 
> Location logic: the institute is near millbank, therefore it is in Westminster. Pinhole books is in morden. I spent plenty of time looking at maps of London and on google maps to make sure the directions were right. And yes i looked up pictures of the London underground. Everything should be accurate. If it's not just let me know. I've been on the London underground maybe once in my life and i was 12 so...
> 
> I'm very sleepy, so if you spot any spelling/grammar errors (also i might have mixed up tenses at some point?) just let me know.


End file.
